


Sinbad the Sailor - Self

by CaptainHadrian



Category: Magi: Adventure of Sinbad (Anime), Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic
Genre: One Shot, been sitting in my docs for a year, but perhaps someone Sin might have needed, the oc is not anyone in particular, this was just something i felt was fitting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2018-11-18
Packaged: 2019-08-25 08:40:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16657813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CaptainHadrian/pseuds/CaptainHadrian
Summary: Sinbad made his way to fame and glory by following his destiny. But destiny is a fickle thing, and fate a malleable destination. A little push, a little advice, and maybe things would have been different for the young boy on his way towards the future.





	Sinbad the Sailor - Self

Sinbad could see it clear as day. 

Even as he sat on his roof, under the stars of the night sky, unable to sleep while his mother was in such a condition. It was there every time he closed his eyes, every time he reached his senses beyond their average capacity. 

The waves.

They seemed to be constantly urging him. Leading to some unknown destination, beckoning him to follow the “flow”. Showing him the way -the path he  _ must _ take. He could lose himself in it, sometimes. In the way the waves churned as if they were a raging sea, rippled like a disturbed pond. He didn’t know what this ocean his senses felt was, but he trusted it. 

It had saved his life many times, after all.

As a young boy, he had wondered why no one else seemed to know the right path. Why they made mistakes. Why they couldn’t find their way when the answer was  _ right there, if only they would look.  _ It had taken time for him to realize that it was only himself that could read the waves. It was only himself that could sense them -overcome them, when they became powerful and deafening. His father had once told him he was special -and Sinbad believed it. He could see something others could not, and that set him apart from everyone else. 

It was the waves that led him to lying on the roof of their home, stargazing, waiting. The waves were active, at a pivotal point. He could feel it in the air, in his very being. Something would happen tonight -something he couldn’t simply run towards as he always did when the waves were active. He couldn’t tell what direction they were leading, what they were trying to tell him.

So there he sat, yawning, unable to understand his power yet knowing the importance of listen to it. The hours passed in silence, the still night warm and the full moon casting a transcendent glow over the town. 

“My, my, you like to live on the edge, don’t you young man?”

He might have started, had he not been expecting something. As it was, Sinbad sat up and observed the person standing in front of his house.

They were shorter than himself, a long, hooded cloak obscuring their features from view. A pair of startling green eyes peered out at him, as if glowing in the night. Their voice was light, yet held a powerful sway to it. The waves -they circled the person like a gentle wind. They held this person in high regard. 

If he tried, he could see the faint glint of fate floating nearby. 

He grinned, “You might say that. I wonder, though, who are you, wandering about this late at night?”

The person chuckled, “Just a traveler. You, though -you are interesting indeed. You can see it, can’t you?”

Sinbad  _ did  _ jerk at the words. This person -they knew? 

“Destiny is a fickle thing, you know,” they continued, “It is never set in stone. One day, you could be following the path to wealth and fortune, the next to poverty or death. It leads you to your objective -but it knows you better than you know yourself, so your future can never be what you believe it as.”

Sinbad stared for a moment. Then he tilted his head, “What does that mean…?”

The figure laughed outright, “Oh, how simple it must be to be a child.” The mirth melted from their eyes, leaving behind a molten expression -of power, of knowledge, of strength beyond actions and words. Sinbad held his breath, unable to tear his own eyes away from the glowing -they were most certainly glowing -orbs. 

“The flow will lead you. It always does. But it the road there is up to you. I will tell you now, if you continue to blindly follow the tide, it will lead to your own ruin. You must know yourself, harness your will, and believe in your own morals to be able to move forward. You must learn to trust yourself if you want to live your life happily. Because the fates may know your future, but only you can forge the path.” 

They looked away. Sinbad blinked, and the person was gone, disappeared in a flurry of light. The only evidence of their presence was the footprints that led down the path to the house, but Sinbad paid this no heed. 

He shook. A tremor that turned his limbs into malleable putty. Those words- those eyes-

They were hollow, lost, broken. 

Despaired. 

And yet, they still held the light of a caring individual. They still held life. They still held the strength to pass on words of wisdom beyond his comprehension.

He sat there until the sun began to rise, at which point he decided that he should begin making breakfast and preparing his mother’s medicine. He would have to go into the city this afternoon to find work. It would be another busy day.

_ The path… destiny… morals... Who was that person?  _

He regarded the waves, and they swirled lazily about, no longer agitated by the event that had occurred that night.  _ Just what does it all mean?  _

Those ominous words struck a chord in his heart. His path, his will, his sense of self. Their importance struck his heart in such a way that he had never felt before. He felt as if he were grounded, for the first time in his life. No longer pulled along by the tides, but as if he finally had both feet firmly on the boat that would keep him afloat  _ -alive-  _ no matter where he ended up. 

The letter he found on the front door was burned in the firepit. He felt the waves, insistent and unyielding, tug him out of the house and off to work. 

For the first time, Sinbad found himself wondering if he should simply run towards it with reckless abandon, as he had for so many years of his life now. Wondering just who he _ really  _ was in the grand scheme of their mighty currents. Because what could destiny possibly want with a simple sailor boy?

_ A simple sailor boy. _ That… was humbling. He smiled.  _ Sinbad the Sailor.  _ That was who he was. A man who would ride these waves, with the deftness and skill of an experienced sailor.  _ But a sailor can choose the current they follow.  _

And it was then he felt it. The urge shifted, and  _ left.  _ It frightened him for a moment, the loss of something he had never gone without. But a smaller, steadier wind pushed him forward.  _ Trust yourself. _

It was a frightening notion. Trust himself? When he could make a mistake? No, he couldn’t. The waves were everything. 

Or… were they?

That question liberated him in a way he couldn’t explain. A chill spread through his body that had nothing to do with the slight morning chill. 

His own path… His own life… His own decisions…

Only now did he realize that, in his urge to follow the current, that he had not once done something with his own prompting. Never once noticed something without the aid of that mystical power.

He never once thought about what he  _ wanted  _ over what he was  _ given.  _

“My own future…”

A smile graced his lips.  _ Yes, that sounds like something I can sail to. _

**Author's Note:**

> So, I don’t really know much about Rhuk in canon, just what I’ve picked up through the anime’s and whatnot. But this was something that bugged me for the longest time -how Sinbad just sort of followed his “fate” until he couldn’t turn back. And I wondered “If he trusted himself more than the fates, what would his life have been like?” 
> 
> Don’t take it too seriously, it was mostly a little self-indulgent piece. The late night visitor is no one from canon. Just someone who had been carried by the fates, maybe, and now followed them even after everything that had happened to them. Wishing, wondering, if things could have been different.


End file.
